Followers

Blog Archive

About Me

Tuesday, February 9, 2010

As a student in elementary school my teachers would always make copies of books or pages from a book. These copies were made to assure that every student have the opportunity to view the text as the teacher teaches. I had not clue that this was not good practice.

While doing my student teaching at a particular elementary school, the school only had reading and math textbooks for class. The teacher would make copies of all the pages in the book in which the lessons came from.

In the article Copyright Cop refers to this as the use of publicly accessible institutional resources to unlawfully distribute copyright material without permission. Making photocopies of a copyright text is illegal.

Question...Can the use of technology become addictive and affect our every day lives?People have become so focused on their hand held gadgets to the point in which relationships with others are being neglected. Texting and communicating through emails has affected our communication skills.

Dr. Akikar a professor at the University of Southern California's school of Medicine stated " Technology addictions can interfere with your social and occupational life. There are also health hazards from sitting in front of the computer for too many hours a day, such as weight gain cardiovascular disease and diabetes.

Tuesday, February 2, 2010

There are many tools available to assist those students with special needs in the classroom or (least restrictive environment). Some include word processing software, word prediction software, hyperlink, basic adaptive keyboards and many more. All of these devices aids with helping special need students in the classroom.

Many students are taking advantage of the word processing software by editing their work instead of submitting it with many errors.it with many errors are taking advantage of the word processing software by editing their work.

Word prediction is a software used to reduce the number of key strokes used to type words. Word prediction is not only used on desktops and in the classroom, but many people are taking advantage of word prediction on the cell phones when typing text messages. Word prediction allows you to type letters of a word and then it will give you suggested spelling of the word.

Hyperlink allows student to gain all the information in witch they need at the click of a button. Children can research the subject matter quickly with hyperlink.

Basic Adaptive Keyboards are designed for those with physical disabilities. It is designed to provide comfort such as colored keys, larger keys and keys placed in alphabetical order for those who has limited range of motion.

Most children with learning disabilities are spending most of their day within a regular classroom, although it may be difficult for the student to follow along with the teacher technology allows them to participate more.

What is the price of this software?

This article was filled with great information that as a future teacher I can always refer back to. This will help me provide my students with the devices or equipment they need to excel.

The most interesting software that gained my attention was voice recognition.(It's really cool) Voice recognition is a software that allows you to use the computer free of hands for those who have physical disabilities that will not allow them to use there hands. Voice recognition can not only be used in the classroom, but also at home. I would love to have this software personally so that I can multi-task.

Another device I found interesting is Basic Adaptive Keyboards. I have never seen keys on a keyboard in color nor have I ever seen keys in alphabetical order on a keyboard. It's funny how your elementary school teacher focused on home row keys but as we all see typing can be accomplished without home row keys.

Technology plays an important role in the lives of those with disabilities so that all children have the opportunity to become successful.